ANAHEIM – Playing it safe was how Hampus Lindholm saw the way he had to play his position when this season began. Playing it safe doesn’t make you a difference-maker.

Lindholm is a defenseman capable of making a difference on the ice and that is how he’s playing his position these days. The Ducks have been the beneficiary of the young Swede not always playing it safe.

The goals he has scored in each of the past three games are the reflection of a willingness to be more aggressive at the offensive end. Lindholm is jumping up into the play more often and getting far better scoring chances.

Having a steady everyday partner in Josh Manson has encouraged him to take more risks.

“This is his first year,” Lindholm said. “I kind of feel like I need to be that safety guy, more of that responsible guy. I can’t be the guy that just goes offensively. Right now I’ve been playing with Manson for a while and getting more comfortable. You know we’re going to have each other (covered).”

Another goal Friday against Arizona after scores in wins over San Jose and the Kings this week gives Lindholm six, tying his total as a rookie and putting him one behind last season’s seven as a second-year player. To Ducks coach Bruce Boudreau, it is Lindholm’s renewed assertiveness with the puck that’s standing out.

“Well, we encourage him to do that,” Boudreau said. “A lot. Because he’s got a great burst of speed. When he’s aggressive offensively, he’s not tentative defensively. He doesn’t get the puck and hang on to it and hang on to it and then make a forced pass.

“When he’s an aggressive player, he’s getting it and he’s moving it. He’s getting it and he’s moving it. It makes his whole game different.”

There was a reason for the tentative play in the first half of the season. Lindholm was adjusting to life without Francois Beauchemin, his defense partner for the first two years. The two made a successful tandem and the adjustment to something new had its challenges.

An initial partnership with veteran newcomer Kevin Bieksa didn’t take and both played poorly. Boudreau broke that up and then had Lindholm playing with different partners, including Korbinian Holzer. And whenever the split-second choice came to jump up in the play or stay back, Lindholm has always erred on the side of caution.

Until now. Manson has become an effective safety valve. And Lindholm is looking more like the player who had a coming-out party in the 2015 playoffs.

“The start of the year, we had a lot of injuries and I was kind of put in a spot to be more of a veteran guy that I not really am,” Lindholm said. “I’ve played a couple of years but I’m still a young guy. But I got to play with Holzy and Manson and a couple of guys.

“I don’t want to be the guy that takes risks offensively that’ll let the other team score behind us. But now I’m just getting more comfortable. When you feel like you have someone covering your back, it’s so much easier to jump up in the play and join the rush.”

Aggressiveness can also take on a physical look. Lindholm isn’t known for throwing his weight around, but his hard skate to knock the Kings’ Anze Kopitar off his skates was the talk of the dressing room after the Ducks’ 4-2 win Thursday night.

Moments later, Lindholm celebrated his power-play goal after Milan Lucic retaliated against him. The Ducks hope to be seeing that well into the future, but they’ve got to reach agreement on a contract extension as the 22-year-old can become a restricted free agent.

It could be lengthy and will be lucrative. Complicating matters is the dispute between agents Ritch Winter and Claude Lemieux, the former Conn Smythe Trophy-winning forward. The one-time business partners have had a falling out and Lindholm said he is now with Lemieux.

“We talked about it a little bit but it’s something that I try not to think about,” Lindholm said of contract talks. “I try to just play hockey out there. That’s going to come. The longer you play hockey, it’s going to follow you.

“I’m just trying to be at my best out there. The team was struggling a little bit at the start but now I think we’re really starting to turn this around here and playing the right way. That’s something I don’t really try to think too much about.”

NOTES

Ryan Getzlaf on Thursday became the second Ducks player to reach 500 assists. Teemu Selanne holds the club record with 532. … Andrew Cogliano appeared in his 671st consecutive game. The winger is eight behind Vancouver’s Henrik Sedin for sixth in NHL history.

Join the conversation

We invite you to use our commenting platform to engage in insightful
conversations about issues in our community. Although we do not pre-screen comments,
we reserve the right at all times to remove any information or materials that are unlawful,
threatening, abusive, libelous, defamatory, obscene, vulgar, pornographic, profane, indecent
or otherwise objectionable to us, and to disclose any information necessary to satisfy the law,
regulation, or government request. We might permanently block any user who abuses these conditions.